Circle of Stone
by markmark261
Summary: The Doctor returns to the one place he should never return to.
1. Missing Adventures

_**Circle of Stone**_

_**Chapter One - Missing Adventures**_

He lay on the floor, wishing he'd just died instead. This was his worst regeneration yet. If this was what his new head felt like then, quite frankly, he wanted a new one. Through eyes that let in far too much light, he saw a figure hunched over him. The hair looked unkempt, the eyes bleary. The Doctor only just recognised him.

"Rory? Rory, my good man, you look terrible." Then he remembered his current plight, and this new face he had. He thought the last one had been oddly-proportioned but this one didn't seem to fit at all. "Tell me, what do I look like?"

"Worse than me," Rory replied, in a voice that seemed far too loud.

The Doctor put his hands over his ears. "You'll have to excuse me, these ears, far more sensitive than my last ones. " He hoped they weren't gigantic like that other time. "What colour's my hair?"

"Brown," Rory said. "The same as always."

"No change there then. What about my eyes?"

"Red," Rory said. "What did you expect after last night?"

"Red? That can't be right? What kind of crazy face is this?"

"It's your kind of crazy face, Doctor."

Best not to think about his new face, besides there were other questions to ask. "What happened to me? I can't remember much, just crawling back to the Tardis."

"I can't remember much either," said Rory. "It was New Year's Eve and we were in Glasgow."

"Did someone deep fry me? Is that how I died?"

Rory looked at him strangely. "You didn't die, Doctor. It just feels like you did. Haven't you had a hangover before?"

"Nonsense, Rory. I don't get hangovers. Drink doesn't affect me; I've drank bottles of the finest 18th century French wine and still been able to outwit automatons."

"We were in a drinking contest with Amy," explained Rory. "That's the last I remember."

"Amy? Where's Amy?" The Doctor said.

"She was fine, it didn't seem to affect her," said Rory. "She's got hollow legs, and long ones at that."

"That's good. Glad she survived at least," said The Doctor, still convinced he was dead. After all, the probability of Rory being right and him being wrong tended to be zero.

"Oh wait, we left her, snuck out on her," said Rory, burying his face in his hands. "Don't you remember?"

Suddenly a whole heap of memories leapt back into The Doctor's head. Oh no, looked like Rory was right about his not dying after all, still, there was a first time for everything. "Oh, I remember now," he said, waving a finger at Rory. "I was going forward twelve months, wanted to wish her Happy New Year twice. Besides, she should be used to me abandoning her by now."

"Twelve months?"

"Only twelve months," The Doctor said, leaping to his feet, and staggering toward the console. "For me, that's early." He started the process of materialisation and cringed at the loud wheezing sound the Tardis made. "Besides, what could have happened in twelve months?"

At that point, the Tardis doors were flung open, and an angry Amy Pond strode into the Tardis. In her arms were two babies, one dressed as a Roman Legionnaire, the other wearing a fez.

"Okay... kids! This is where things get complicated."


	2. Wrong Turn

_**Chapter Two - Wrong Turn**_

"I've got so much to tell you, Doctor," said Amy Pond, brandishing her babies, "but first, maybe some kind of apology's in order."

"That's all right, you can apologise later," The Doctor reassured her, looking at the babies and pulling out his sonic screwdriver.

"Me?! Apologise?"

"Well, you're a year late, and you just bring along these uninvited guests, though admittedly the one with the fez is adorable."

"You're lucky I'm holding these babies, Doctor," Amy growled."And to think, I was worried about you making it back to the Tardis. That was a waste of a sticker."

"A sticker?" asked The Doctor.

"It's on your ba-" Rory began to point out.

"It's not important!" Amy said, cutting Rory off dead.

"And why wouldn't I find my way back?" asked a puzzled Doctor.

"You could barely find your way to your feet," began Amy. "I've never seen anyone so drunk."

"I'm sure I wasn't-"

"You weren't just dancing the giraffe, you were doing the whole safari by night's end," she continued. "You made Glasgow look sober. You're their new hero, they replaced that portrait of a potato with one of you."

It was now Rory's turn to interrupt, "Could we save this till another time? I'm more interested in what happened while we were away."

"Quite right, Rory," said The Doctor, thankful to be turning his attention back to the babies. "So, what's been happening here?"

"Well-" began Amy.

The Doctor interrupted her, "No, I was asking this handsome young fellow."

Amy raised an eyebrow, while the baby in a fez gurgled back.

"Quite right," said The Doctor, "better not get too close. Can't risk touching."

"Who are they?" asked Rory.

"They're us," explained The Doctor, "though you seem to be much younger, Rory."

"You seem to be a lot younger too," pointed out Amy.

"Of course I do," said The Doctor, deciding that now was complicated enough without dragging regeneration into the mix. "The little chap didn't seem too sure, bright but not a lot of information."

"What about baby me?" asked Rory.

"I'm sure he'd be an incredible help," The Doctor said, "if he wasn't so obsessed with Amy's breasts."

The older Rory looked embarrassed, as he gave Amy a half-smile.

"No change there then," said Amy. "Anyway, I think I better warn you-"

"No time," said The Doctor. "We better get out of here, while we still can. Maybe the Reapers will arrive or-"

"But, Doctor," Amy yelled, "we're heading towards danger and -"

However, Amy's words came too late, drowned out by the sound of the Tardis dematerialising, for The Doctor was already dancing around the Tardis's control panel, turning dials. pushing handles, pulling levers. "Have to keep moving," he said, as he kept moving. "Can't stay in the present, need to buy ourselves some time."

And so Amy could only stand and watch and hold the babies as the Tardis lurched back in time to a completely new time and place. However, to be completely accurate, although it was a completely new time, it wasn't a completely new place, not for The Doctor anyway, as he would soon discover.

He opened the Tardis's door, and stuck his head out, only to see he was in a dark basement, with a familiar white stone face staring back at him.

"Oops!" he exclaimed.

"What is it, Doctor?" asked Amy and Rory and the baby in a fez, while baby Rory stayed silent, still transfixed by Amy's fleshy mounds.

The Doctor looked back to tell them, and then realised, just as he was about to open his mouth, that that was the very last thing he should have been doing.

Still, at least he didn't blink.


	3. The Angels Have The Phone Box

_**Chapter Three - The Angels Have The Phone Box**_

The Doctor looked back at the passengers of the Tardis, all but one of them staring at the monster standing behind him. He saw the fear in Amy's eyes, as she held the babies tightly to her, much to baby Rory's approval.

"Yes, it's a Weeping Angel, Amy," said The Doctor, twirling his sonic screwdriver, "but no need to panic. The thing is, we're now back in a basement that the Tardis was in a long time ago, when it was surrounded by Weeping Angels."

"And that's supposed to make us panic less?" asked a worried Rory.

"Just relax," said The Doctor, "and keep staring at the angel behind me and, whatever you do, don't blink."

"That's what you told me last time," said Amy. "And I ended up almost becoming one."

"Good point, Amy, but these ones are weakened," lectured The Doctor. "All they can do is send us back in time, and before they can do anything like that, I'll just close the Tardis door on them and we'll be on our way. It's really that simp-"

And that's when the other angels started to shake the Tardis. As Amy turned her attention back to the babies and not losing her balance, Rory turned his attention to Amy, stepping in front of her, his arms reaching out to steady her.

Sadly no one was looking at The Doctor, or at the Weeping Angel who was moving in on him.

The Doctor lurched with the Tardis, then turned around, just as the Tardis stopped its shaking, in time to see a stone hand touch his shoulder.

The others looked at him in shock, as he continued standing there, smiling like an idiot.

"Told you there was nothing to worry about," he said. "We're safe in the Tardis. Its temporal grace circuits won't let the Angel send me back in time. There's no time-travelling in the Tardis unless it says so, otherwise things just get too confusing. So, no being sent back into the past for me, no chronal energy for the Weeping Angel."

Amy burst out laughing, as she looked at The Doctor standing there. "You had me so worried there."

"Worried? About what?" The Doctor looked around. "Where are we? Where did Glasgow go?"

"Doctor, are you okay?" asked Amy, now worried once again, but it was clear The Doctor wasn't okay. He looked around, befuddlement on his face, a stone hand on his shoulder, and then his head fell back and his arms stretched out and suddenly he lit up as glowing beams of energy flowed into his body. After that was over, he lifted his head again, looked around, and the same puzzled expression was still there, but on an entirely new face.

"Doctor?" Amy said softly, but this wasn't her Doctor. He looked older, although his brown eyes seemed so much younger.

The Doctor looked at his Tardis full of strangers. "What?" And then he realised this wasn't even his Tardis. "What?" And then he couldn't even remember what he was thinking about. "What?"

And then the glowing beams once again flowed into him, and this time it left him looking older still, with close-cropped hair, big ears and an even bigger grin. He looked out at this strange new world, not knowing what to make of it, full of curiosity. "Fantastic!" he said, before yet another transformation racked his body, leaving him older and bearded.

And all of the time, The Doctor's chronal energy flowed into the Weeping Angel, who grew stronger and stronger.


	4. Talkin' 'Bout Degeneration

**_Chapter Four - Talkin' 'Bout Degeneration_**

Amy Pond was confused. At first, it seemed like the Weeping Angel was converting The Doctor into older different people, but now there seemed no rhyme nor reason to it. Whoever these people were, they kept shouting out for other people who weren't there - Ace, Mel, Peri, Adric - and then, as if his pyrotechnic transformations of earlier hadn't been startling enough, now a weird white figure pulled out of his body and ran away backwards, and then The Doctor's hair exploded into a mass of brown curls and his eyes stared wildly. Still, although this made no sense to Amy, she couldn't just stand idly by.

"Take these," she said to Rory, passing him the babies, then strode over to The Doctor, pulling him away from the Weeping Angel's grasp just as he was enquiring about its jelly baby needs. Just as she did so, he transformed once again, his hair turning white and permy.

"Unhand me, my dear," said the bouffanted man who remained, brushing her away. "I'll have you know I'm a master of Venusian Aikido." And with that, he rushed out of the Tardis.

"No, Doctor!" she yelled, rushing out after him, but, as she emerged into the basement, she saw him, his face turned away from her, the sticker that she'd stuck on his back a year ago that day still attached and visible. Unfortunately, as he rushed up some stairs, his ankle was being touched by a smiling Weeping Angel, but not for long since, unprotected by the Tardis, the Weeping Angel's touch immediately sent The Doctor spiralling into the past. She'd put that sticker on The Doctor's back in case he'd not made his way back to the Tardis, but it was of little use now.

"No..." she gasped, as she backed away from the Angel, towards the Tardis, making sure she didn't blink. At least she still had Rory, who'd be taking good care of the babies, but then, as she got back inside, she saw that he'd been looking after them too well, giving them all his attention. There, where he'd been, wrapped up in his clothes, was yet another baby Rory, and standing over him, frozen in her glare, was the Weeping Angel who'd earlier changed The Doctor.

"Great, what else could go wrong?" she said, as she slumped against the Tardis's console, her eyes on a constant non-blinking look out.

"Hello, Mumsie," came a woman's voice from outside.

"River?!" Amy said, as a familiar face appeared in the doorway.

"Well, I could hardly miss Tardis Babies, could I?" She walked into the Tardis, dressed in a figure-hugging white lycra jumpsuit. "The Doctor kept telling me about today. Sounds a riot." She fired her blaster, disintegrating the Weeping Angel, then closed the Tardis door behind her.

"I'm sure we'll all laugh about it later," Amy said, taking advantage of the opportunity to blink.

"You will," River reassured her, walking over to the three babies, and picking up the one with the fez. "Hello, Sweetie."

"So, what am I supposed to do next?" asked Amy. "And when do the killer gerbils arrive?"

River scrunched up her face. "Spoilers."

"That's right, you can't tell me, your own mother."

"No, not that kind of spoiler," she said, screwing up her nose, and passing the pungent baby to Amy, "I think he needs changing."

"Terrific, as if I didn't have to put up with enough of his sh-"

But before Amy could finish her sentence, the Tardis started rocking again.

"I don't suppose," said Amy, cradling the baby Doctor, as baby Rorys rolled around the floor, "that you could get us out of here."

"No problem," said River, hanging onto the Tardis's controls, "but where do we go?"

"I know exactly where to go," said Amy, as she suddenly remembered back to the most important night of her life. "Back to where it all began."


	5. Meanwhile, Back In The Past

**_Chapter Five - Meanwhile, Back In The Past_**

The Doctor was not a happy Time Lord. There were three reasons for this.

The first was his confusion. The Doctor didn't like being confused, especially since others were better-suited for it. Still, he couldn't see any obvious explanation as to why, one second, he'd been at UNIT with Jo Grant and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, and the next, he was being manhandled by some red-haired lady. Rather than unleash his Venusian Aikido on her, he'd taken the gallant action of running away, out of the Tardis, past some statues. He remembered rushing up some stairs in the dark, feeling something brush against his ankle, and then, when he reached the top of the stairs, he'd turned on the light and looked down, only to see that the statues and the Tardis had now disappeared.

That was another reason he wasn't happy. He missed his Tardis. Since leaving the basement, he'd wandered far and wide, but found not a trace of it. It seemed that the wicked red-haired lady and her brown-haired baby-holding accomplice had absconded with it. Imagine stealing a Tardis, the nerve of some people.

And, of course, there was the real reason he wasn't happy. The bow tie, the tweed jacket - it just didn't suit him. Fortunately, at this point in his travels, in the dead of night, he found himself passing a second-hand shop, and there in the window - he always checked shop windows, you never knew when Autons might invade - he spotted some clothes worthy of him. A bit worn and shabby perhaps, but definitely an improvement on his current ensemble.

A smile finally replaced his frown, as he brought out the unfeasibly-large sonic screwdriver that he'd found in his pocket, and made short work of breaking in. First, he grabbed the suit from the window display, and then, since no cloaks were available, he decided to help himself to a hat. In return, he'd leave the horrendous tweed jacket and the far-too-tight trousers, though he doubted anyone would want to buy them.

As he pulled off the tweed jacket, he suddenly noticed a sticker on the back of it. He shone his sonic screwdriver on the sticker and looked at the words on it, handwritten in blue biro: "If lost, please return this man to a big blue police telephone box." But there were other words afterwards, so The Doctor shone his screwdriver on those, as he read the next sentence: "Otherwise, please return to Amy Pond in Leadworth."

The Doctor rushed to get changed, then ran out of the shop and into the road, straight into the path of some headlights. The oncoming car would have just enough time to come to a halt, he calculated, and he was right.

"What in blazes do you think you're doing?" asked the driver, getting out of his car. He was bearded with shaggy brown hair and an unmistakably-American accent.

"I need to get to Leadworth," said The Doctor, looking at the driver, who was now calming down. The face seemed awfully familiar. "Do I know you?"

The driver just looked at him in confusion. "Never seen you before," he said, "but I'm going there if you want to share a ride."

"Marvellous! What are the odds?" wondered The Doctor, as he adjusted his new hat. "Better get a move on though. It's starting to rain."

"Sure thing, Mr. -"

"I'm The Doctor," replied The Doctor.

"I'm a paramedic," replied the man. "But you can call me Rory."

And with that, they both got into the car and set off towards Leadworth.


End file.
